The Onion CEO regrets using an AI-generated image as basis for art

I am quite certain that's it. Artists in general are widely upset about the fact that these things have been fed with the copyrighted work of literally millions of artists, without payment.

The AI companies try to pass it off as learning the style, same as an art student studying a work of art. For all I know that may even be legal. But it sure seems dubious, and when combined with the fact that it seems likely to put a lot of artists out of work (already a dicey proposition), they're rightly angry.

It sure doesn't help that most AI art is just plain bad. It sucks to be thrown out of work for somebody who is crummy at your job, but is willing to do it for practically nothing.

Despite arguably having the best text and image models, Google sure isn’t getting the press of its cohorts, is it?

You seem to have confused one guy's personal account with the famously apolitical media outlet he runs.